Personal Evangelism: Winning Souls
Since it is true that the majority of people in the Church have never won a soul to Christ, the subject of personal evangelism is timely.
I have heard of a pastor who once asked the officers of his church to be perfectly frank with him and tell him how many of them had ever led a soul to Christ. There were fifteen present, five of whom stood to say that they had had this joy and ten remained seated. One gentleman rose immediately to say that the question had condemned him, that he had four boys, one of whom was a church member, and to his shame he confessed that three of them he had never spoken to on the subject of their soul’s salvation. He went immediately to his home that night to fulfill his obligation and the three boys came into the church at the first opportunity. He said that there had been a man coming into his place of business for years. He knew him to be a sinful man but he had never spoken to him 137 about his spiritual condition. When in a few days this man entered his business house again and when his errand was completed on which he had come, the church officer said to him, “Did you know that I was a Christian?” and he said, “Yes.” “I wonder,” he said, “if you knew that I was an officer in the church,” and he said, “Yes, I knew it,” and then he said, “I wonder if you have ever thought it strange that I had not spoken to you about your souL” The man’s face became very white as he said, “I have thought it strange and I have come again and again into your place of business and waited after I had finished my errand, hoping that you would speak to me and you never have, and now it is too late.”
There are two things that must be kept constantly in mind if we are to be successful in this kind of evangelism.
First: We must believe that men without Christ are lost. There is no doubt about it at all. The word of God has distinctly stated it and on the authority of that word we have a right to proclaim that there is only one way of salvation and that is by the way that is marked by the blood of the Son of God.
Second: We must be impressed with the fact that we are largely responsible for the winning of these who are lost. I am my brother’s keeper whether I appreciate it or not.
A father in Chicago one day came to his home from his place of business to find his only son dying. He thought it best to tell him that he was near the end and so he said, “The doctor says that to-morrow morning you will be with Jesus Christ,” and then with an almost breaking heart he began to sob. The boy still holding his hand drew him towards him as he said, “Father, don’t you cry about it for just as soon as I see Jesus Christ I will tell him that ever since I can remember you at all you have tried to lead me to him,” and unless our children can say that about us and unless our friends can have the same impression concerning us, we have been disloyal to Christ and unfaithful to them. There is a tremendous responsibility resting upon every Christian to attempt at least to win the individuals with whom he comes in contact, for Christ.
Possibly no better suggestion could be made as to the way in which we should work together than simply to be natural. A perfunctory manner will not impress except unfavorably and an unnatural way of speaking will not win, far from it. If we could only learn to talk about Christ as we talk about our earthly friends, what satisfaction there would be in speaking to those who are lost about him.
If we would be soul winners as a rule it is wise for us first to seek out those in whom we are interested when they are disengaged. Ordinarily it will profit little to approach a man in the midst of his business or attempt to talk to a woman when she is taken up with household cares, but that person must have a heart of stone who could listen to an earnest appeal made out of a full heart sometimes with tears which cannot be kept back, and still be unmoved.
First: It is wise for us to speak, however, whenever providence seems to indicate that we should do so. I once went to call upon a young man at the suggestion of one of his friends. He was dying with consumption. I was obliged to give my word that I would not speak to him about his soul for fear that it might frighten him. I was simply to go and talk in a general way, winning his confidence, and to lead him to Christ at a subsequent time. I can still remember his white face on the pillow, and I can still feel the touch of his cold hand as I said good-bye and went away. The next morning I came to see him, only to have the information that he was dead, that he had died shortly after I was in his room, unwarned and lost so far as his friends knew, and yet I had looked into his eyes and held his hand in mine and had not won him.
As to the manner in which we go aside from being natural, let it be remembered that first of all we must be kindly. As a rule we need not go with an argument, for not many people are won that way. Men do not think their way into the Kingdom of God, they may think their way to the boundary line of the Kingdom, but the step into life is a step taken by faith.
Second: We must be very solemn about it, for while it is a joyous thing to be a Christian, yet at the same time it is an exceedingly solemn errand upon which we have come to tell them that they are hopeless widiout Christ.
One of the ofEceis of my Church once drove four miles through a blinding snow-storm, on such a mission. He was an old man and could not well leave his comfortable home, but when he stood in the blacksmith shop of a young man.
who was amazed txp see him there on a stormy day, he said to him, I promised your old father that I would look after you spiritually and I have never spoken to you. Oh, my friend! “he said, “I am concerned for your soul.” He turned away and went to his home, thinking he had made a dismal failure of it, was ill for days and did not come again to the meetings, but that very night the young man came to the Church to say that he never had been moved either by a sermon or a song in his life, but the solemn word of that old faithful Christian had stirred him through and through, and he rose that night to make his confession of his Saviour.
Third: If it is possible, pray with them and for them. I have for years known intimately a gentleman who was one of seven sons, six of them were Christians but one of them was far away from Christ. He had almost broken his mother’s heart, who was wearying for him as the Scotch people say. One of her old neighbors
came in and said,” Mrs. M, why don’t
you give John up; you have six boys for Christ, rejoice in them and let him go.” “My old mother,” said my friend, “rose to her feet, and taking hold of the chair for support, said, ‘I will never give him up. I gave him to God before he was born, I carried him to the Church as soon as I could walk and placed him upon the altar; he is God’s child and he will have him if he turns the world over to get him, and she lived long enough,” said my friend, “to see her boy a Christian, a judge of one of the highest courts in America and an officer in the Church.”
But when all these suggestions have been made and the rules of men have been studied, this one thing must constantly be remembered, there must be the deepest sort of concern. Without this preaching becomes profes^ional and our efTort mechanical, our evangelism is not the sort that takes hold upon the hearts of lost people, and one of the most encouraging signs of the times is that there seems to be a deepening concern on the part of men and women in the Church that the lost should know Christ.
In an Eastern town a series of meetings was in progress. The ministers were preaching night after night and one night the Baptist minister was asked to preach and invite the lost to take a stand for Christ. He stood pleading with those to come to the front who desired to know him as a Saviour, and at last one of his brother ministers said to him, “Doctor, it is useless to wait longer, they have all come for to-night,” and yet he waited. “Will not another one come?” he said, and finally in the audience a young man started to the front. The minister met him half-way down the aisle, threw his arms around him as he said, “Oh, my son, my son, you have come, you have come,” and then he went back to the platform to say, “I think I should have died if he had not taken a stand for Christ to-night,” and one who sat with him on the platform said that he believed that he was almost nearer dead than alive as he stood waiting and pleading.
Such concern alwa)^ has weight with the unsaved for it may be set down as a rule that the lost people of our homes and communities are never more concerned for themselves than we are concerned for them.